Please act now! We need your Congress member's signature on the Lee-Rigell Letter opposing a military attack on Iraq. Consult the list (see below). If your member of Congress is not there, call the Congressional switchboard ASAP (before Close of Business July, 2nd) and ask them to sign on to the Lee-Rigell Letter. Republicans may be willing to sign on, so it's worth trying them as well. The Switchboard number is 202-224-3121. Tell them to contact Rep. Barbara Lee's staffer Monica Pham at Monica.Pham@mail.house.gov

We join many of you and in the international community who are expressing grave concern over the rise in sectarian violence in Iraq over the last days and weeks. We agree that any solution to this complex crisis can only be achieved through a political settlement, and only if the process and outcome is inclusive of all segments of the Iraqi population—anything short of that cannot successfully bring stability to Iraq or the region.

As President Obama considers options for U.S. intervention, we urge respect for the constitutional requirements for using force abroad. The Constitution vests in Congress the power and responsibility to authorize offensive military action abroad. As such, the use of military force in Iraq is something the Congress should fully debate and authorize.

Please join us in sending a letter to President Obama on the use of military force in Iraq. Members of Congress must consider all the facts and alternatives before we can determine whether military action would contribute to ending this most recent violence, create a climate for political stability, and protect civilians from greater harm.

For questions, or to sign, please contact Monica Pham with Rep. Barbara Lee or John Thomas with Rep. Scott Rigell ASAP.

Sincerely, Barbara Lee Scott Rigell Member of Congress Member of Congress

Dear Mr. President:

We join you and with those in the international community who are expressing grave concern over the rise in sectarian violence in Iraq over the last days and weeks. The consequences of this development are particularly troubling given the extraordinary loss of American lives and expenditure of funds over ten years that was claimed to be necessary to bring democracy, stability and a respect for human rights to Iraq.

We support your restraint to date in resisting the calls for a "quick" and "easy" military intervention, and for your commitment not to send combat troops back to Iraq. We also appreciate your acknowledgement that this conflict requires a political solution, and that military action alone cannot successfully lead to a resolution.

We do not believe intervention could be either quick or easy. And, we doubt it would be effective in meeting either humanitarian or strategic goals, and that it could very well be counter-productive.

This is a moment for urgent consultations and engagement with all parties in the region who could bring about a cease fire and launch a dialogue that could lead to a reconciliation of the conflict.

Any solution to this complex crisis can only be achieved through a political settlement, and only if the process and outcome is inclusive of all segments of the Iraqi population—anything short of that cannot successfully bring stability to Iraq or the region.

As you consider options for U.S. intervention, we write to urge respect for the constitutional requirements for using force abroad. The Constitution vests in Congress the power and responsibility to authorize offensive military action abroad. The use of military force in Iraq is something the Congress should fully debate and authorize.

Members of Congress must consider all the facts and alternatives before we can determine whether military action would contribute to ending this most recent violence, create a climate for political stability, and protect civilians from greater harm.

The stunning military advance into cities in northern and central Iraq by an Al Qaeda offshoot, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria—backed by some of Iraq's Sunni tribal paramilitary forces and a militia tied to remnants of the deposed Baath party—compounds Iraq's long-running tragedy.

For thirty-four years—through the Iran-Iraq War (1980–88), the Gulf War (1990–91), the brutal US-led sanctions against Iraq (1990–2003) and the devastation that followed the US invasion in 2003—Iraq's people have suffered unspeakably. Now the ISIS-led offensive is adding to that suffering. In seizing Falluja, Mosul and a string of other cities, ISIS has left devastation and mass executions in its wake, and it is aggressively provoking a revival of the Sunni-versus-Shiite civil war that left thousands dead between 2005 and 2008.

But American military involvement in the latest eruption in Iraq, reportedly under consideration by President Obama, would be the wrong response to that suffering, morally and strategically. Even if limited to airstrikes, whether from F-16s, cruise missiles or drones, military action by Washington would almost certainly kill civilians, especially since ISIS is concentrated in heavily populated cities. Worse, such action would inflame, not ease, Iraq's sectarian divisions, allying Washington more closely with Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki's monumentally corrupt and sectarian regime and against a seething Sunni population, and would send recruits streaming into ISIS's camp.

President Obama has hinted that he'll make any US military support conditional on a change in Maliki's sectarian style of governance. Since taking office, Maliki has excluded Sunnis from power—dismantling the Sunni tribal militia of the Anbar Awakening, accusing leading Sunni politicians of "terrorism," creating security and intelligence machinery that reports only to him, and installing pet generals throughout an army so corrupt and incompetent that it simply fled at the start of the ISIS offensive. But if the United States couldn't persuade Maliki to change his spots when it had some 150,000 troops in-country and advisers in every ministry, it certainly can't do so long-distance. Despite eight years of blood and treasure lost in the Iraqi quagmire after 2003, the United States has precious little leverage left.

Since the departure of US forces in 2011, Obama has been under attack by hawks, neoconservatives and Bush administration refugees in Washington's think tanks for ending the war. Their catechism, repeated endlessly, is that Obama left too soon, abandoning Iraq to civil war. Now, after the ISIS offensive, the "Obama lost Iraq" mantra is on a Fox News loop, echoed in The Wall Street Journal and by the likes of John McCain. This narrative gets the whole story wrong. (Not surprising, since this was the same crowd that was so woefully wrong in calling for war in 2003. How many times does the Beltway hawk caucus get to be wrong before the media realize they don't know what they're talking about?)

First, of course, the Iraq civil war is the direct result of the Bush administration's criminal decision in 2003, illegal under international law, to attack a country that was not involved in 9/11, had no weapons of mass destruction and posed no threat to the United States. That invasion and the subsequent occupation destroyed Iraq's central institutions, including the army, the police and the Baath party. In the fight to fill the resulting power vacuum, Iraqis separated into Shiite, Kurdish and Sunni camps, a trend fostered by US occupation authorities. The countless dead left on the streets of Iraq's cities, then and now, are on George W. Bush's head.

Second, the decision to withdraw entirely from Iraq in 2011 was signed in Baghdad by President Bush himself in 2008, as the price for that year's Status of Forces Agreement. On taking office, Obama tried to undo that decision. He pressured Maliki to allow a sizable contingent of US troops to remain in Iraq past 2011, but those negotiations failed. Ostensibly, they failed because of sticking points like Washington's demand that Iraq extend legal immunity to US troops, which Iraq felt was a violation of its sovereignty. But the talks actually collapsed because Iraq didn't want US troops to stay. Not only did many Sunnis—who might have favored the United States as a stabilizing presence—argue that America was an occupying power; the government installed by Bush & Co., heavily weighted toward sectarian Shiites with close ties to Iran, didn't want the United States to stay either. That's partly because Iran, which has enormous influence in Baghdad, didn't want any US role in Iraq, and made its wishes clear to Maliki in no uncertain terms. So, short of toppling Maliki, the United States was out.

But if Obama isn't to blame for the US withdrawal from Iraq, there is one important way the president is responsible for making the crisis worse: by fanning the flames of civil war in Syria. Washington opposes ISIS in Iraq but supports the armed opposition to Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, which includes that selfsame ISIS along with many other Islamist militias, including the Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda ally. By arming and training Syrian fighters (mostly through proxies like Saudi Arabia and Qatar), the Obama administration helped create space in Syria for ISIS to grow. Although Al Qaeda broke with ISIS because the latter was too indiscriminately violent, ISIS grew more powerful in northern and eastern Syria with funding from wealthy private sources in the Gulf states. It erased much of the Syria-Iraq border, built camps in Anbar and seized Falluja in January. In essence, the wars in Syria and Iraq have merged into one. The best step Obama can take now is to back off in Syria, ending support for the rebels there and seeking to work with Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Russia in search of a regional political solution.

Rather than compound the suffering with more American missiles, Obama should provide humanitarian relief for the estimated half-million refugees who have fled the ISIS offensive. The region is already buckling under the strain of what has become the world's worst humanitarian crisis because of the Syrian war, which nearly 3 million have fled, with more than twice that number internally displaced. The most constructive action from Washington would be to send food, clothing, shelter and medicine to relieve the suffering.

In some ways, the conflicts in Iraq and Syria are proxy wars that pit Saudi Arabia against Iran, and have plunged the region into a sectarian rivalry, with Riyadh and Tehran backing Sunnis and Shiites, respectively. So the next thing Obama ought to do—rather than bomb Iraq—is to encourage a Saudi-Iranian rapprochement.

In recent months, Iran and Saudi Arabia have tentatively sought to reconcile, and the ISIS scare could drive them closer together. Iran is of course bitterly opposed to ISIS and doesn't want it to disturb its client in Baghdad (indeed, after ISIS seized Mosul, Gen. Qassim Suleimani, head of Iran's Quds force, offered Tehran's assistance, and it seems certain that Iran is supporting some of the many Shiite militias mobilizing to battle ISIS). And while Saudi Arabia supports sectarian Sunni movements around the world, it considers ISIS, Al Qaeda and the like beyond the pale. Iranian president Hassan Rouhani has reached out to Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the Gulf states. A Saudi-Iranian accord could vastly ease the crises in Syria and Iraq, nudging the leaders in Damascus and Baghdad toward a more open, accommodating stance. Iran and Saudi Arabia could work with Turkey in both countries, too. If Obama believes the rhetoric of his recent West Point speech favoring diplomacy over military action, he'll invest his energy—and that of Secretary of State John Kerry and Vice President Joe Biden—in precisely that tall diplomatic task.

Washington DC – Today, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the bipartisan McGovern-Jones-Lee resolution which requires the President to seek Congressional authorization before deploying armed services engaged in combat operations in Iraq.

“This resolution reclaims Congressional responsibility in matters of war and peace. In 2001, Congress gave the Administration a blank check for endless war and it’s long past time for Congress to take back that authority,” said Congresswoman Lee. “Enough is enough. After more than decade of war, the American people are war-weary; we must end the culture of endless war and repeal the AUMFs.”

Recent polling by Public Policy Polling found seventy-four percent of American voters oppose military action in Iraq.

“There is no military solution in Iraq,” said Congresswoman Lee. “Any lasting solution must be political and respect the rights of all Iraqis.”

“This resolution is a step in the right direction but Congress needs to repeal the AUMFs that serve as a blank check for endless war,” added Congresswoman Lee.

Congresswoman Lee authored H.R. 3852 to repeal the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. Congresswoman Lee joined Congressman Rigell in a bipartisan letter signed by more than 100 Members of Congress calling on President Obama to seek Congressional authorization before taking military action in Iraq.

The Obama administration seems poised to bomb insurgent-controlled areas of Iraq in another escalation of the deepening quagmire.

The administration's reason is "humanitarian", a rationale which could have been given countless times before. Air strikes are unlikely to block the offensive by the extremists of ISIS who are bent on forming a sectarian Sunni Caliphata in the territory they have seized in Syria and Iraq.

If Obama uses U.S air power he will be rejecting a war powers resolution passed by 300 House of Representative members last week which requires a report to Congress and a limited timetable before an authorizing vote is required. Obama already has dispatched several hundred U.S troops as "advisers" to the faltering Baghdad army already trained and financed by US taxpayers. A majority of Democrats oppose executive action without congressional hearings and approval. Rep. Jim McGovern, primary author of the House resolution, predicted that military action might take place during the congressional recess.

The alternative is not "surrendering to terrorism", as the War Lobby claims. In Obama's calculation, apparently, it is simpler to fire bombs and missiles at the war zone than to threaten the authoritarian al-Maliki regime in Baghdad with a cutoff in funds unless they reach a power-sharing accommodation with the Sunni and Kurdish minority communities. Al-Maliki's stubborn insistence on disenfranchising and rounding up thousands of Sunnis in Iraq drove many of them into their present alliance with ISIS in the vast swath of territory linking southern Syria and northern Iraq. As long as al-Maliki remains in power, Iraq's Sunnis will have no incentive to rebuild a power-sharing state.

It is not a lack of sympathy with the historic and current circumstance of Iraq’s religious minorities—or of other persecuted peoples in that traumatized country—that leads some of the most humane and responsible members of Congress to say that President Obama must seek approval from the House and Senate before committing the United States military to a new Iraq mission.

Nor is it isolationism or pacifism that motivates most dissent.

Rather, it is a healthy respect for the complex geopolitics of the region combined with a regard for the wisdom of the system of checks and balances and the principles of advice and consent outlined in the US Constitution.

Consider the case of Barbara Lee.

Few members of the House of Representatives have a so long and distinguished a record of commitment to respecting and protecting the interests of vulnerable populations in distant lands than Lee, a California Democrat who has been deeply engaged in international human rights advocacy since her days as an aide to former Congressman Ron Dellums, D-California.

Since her election to Congress in 1998, Lee has been the essential author or co-author of major pieces of legislation dealing with international HIV/AIDS issues, including the measure that created the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria. She organized bipartisan coalitions to respond to genocide in Darfur.

She was a leader the effort to establish the position of special adviser for orphans and vulnerable children. She has served as a US representative to the United Nations. And she has argued, well and wisely, that the hard work of diplomacy, the provision of humanitarian aid, the steady support of international institutions and the recognition of distinct regional issues is invariably more likely to help the world’s most vulnerable peoples than war-making.

Of course Barbara Lee supports immediate and intensive efforts to provide vital aid to the Yazidi people, a religious minority facing harrowing threats from the militant forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Of course, she wants to aid and protect religious, cultural and ethnic minorities.

That is why she was one of the first members of the House to express support for “humanitarian efforts to prevent genocide in Iraq.”

Lee praises the president for announcing that “there’s no American military solution to the larger crisis in Iraq.”

But she still expresses legitimate concern about “US mission creep in Iraq and escalation into a larger conflict, which I oppose.”

Within hours of President Obama’s announcement that, in addition to humanitarian efforts, he was authorizing military airstrikes on ISIS forces, Lee called for the president “to seek congressional authorization before any combat operations.”

“For too long, Congress has abdicated its Constitutional role in matters of war and peace,” she explained. “The President should come to Congress for authorization of any further military action in Iraq.”

Lee is not alone in worrying about the threat of US mission creep in Iraq.

Congressman Jim McGovern, the Massachusetts Democrat who has been an outspoken advocate for hunger relief and related humanitarian initiatives, warned with regard to the airstrikes ordered last week by the president, “These strikes do involve the United States directly in hostilities, regardless of how limited they are and regardless of whether there’s a humanitarian purpose involved."

In July, the House voted overwhelmingly for a resolution written by McGovern, Lee and Congressman Walter Jones, R-North Carolina, which explicitly signaled opposition to any prolonged US military intervention in Iraq without congressional approval.

“We made it very clear that we believe Congress has a significant constitutional role to play,” says McGovern, who explains, “When we bomb ISIS, which is a horrible group, we have to realize that we are heading down the path of choosing sides in an ancient religious and sectarian war inside Iraq. While choosing sides may be something Congress decides that it wants to support, it goes beyond the humanitarian mission of providing relief to civilians stranded on a mountain in imminent danger of dying of hunger and thirst. It goes beyond protecting our military and diplomatic personnel. I am concerned that we are already seeing these different missions blur into one in the press and in Congress. That is deeply troubling.”

Congressman John Garamendi, a California Democrat who has remained deeply involved with conflict resolution in the African region where he served as a Peace Corps volunteer, was quick to voice support for the “ongoing humanitarian mission of airdropping food and water” into Iraq. But he added, “I am seriously concerned that these targeted strikes may become a slippery slope.”

Garamendi says, “Congress needs greater clarity on the objectives of this expanding action.”

That clarity will benefit not just Congress but President Obama.

Even close allies of the president, such as Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, the number-two Democrat in the Senate, insist that escalation “is not in the cards.”

“We cannot send the troops, we must not send the troops,” Durbin argued on NBC’s Meet the Press. “Escalating it is not in the cards. Neither the American people nor Congress are in the business of wanting to escalate this conflict beyond where it is today. I think the President’s made it clear this is a limited strike. He has, I believe, most Congressional support for that at this moment. To go beyond is really going to be a challenge.”

Arizona Senator John McCain and his neoconservative allies take a different view, as do some liberal interventionists. But the necessity of congressional debate is about more than partisanship and ideology. All sides should recognize not just the requirement of congressional consent but the value of the process.

There is a mistaken notion that the system of checks and balances threatens the authority of the presidency. In fact, it can, and often does, provide necessary definition for a commander in chief. When a president seeks the advice and consent of Congress for military intervention, the process itself conveys authority—along with a broad understanding of the mission that is being proposed.

This is as the founders of the American experiment intended, and that intent remains entirely appropriate. If a president proposes a fool’s mission, Congress should be able to prevent him from embarking upon it. If a president proposes a necessary mission, Congress can and in all likelihood will give approval—not always as quickly as the commander in chief would prefer, but on a timeline (and wi th parameters) that will balance executive urgency with legislative caution. It is not a lack of conscience, or humanity, that inspires the demand that every president—be he a Democrat or she a Republican, be he a conservative or she a liberal—seek the approval of Congress before intervening militarily in a distant land. It a basic premise of the American experiment, as outlined in our Constitution and in our common sense of who we are and how we might best respond to a dangerous and difficult world.

As President Obama allows a trickle of troops back into Iraq and continues to ramp up air strikes against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Americans are wary about our role in a conflict most think we never should have started in the first place. Polls show that while Americans are divided on new airstrikes in Iraq, most people are against sending troops back. And while these strikes might seem targeted, mission creep is a very real threat in Iraq.

Aside from the obvious concern about dangers to our troops, U.S. involvement in Iraq also comes at another cost: money spent on war is money that’s not available to address our other priorities. We have a border crisis, high unemployment, a growing student loan debt problem, to name a few. While the Pentagon has not specified how much the renewed conflict has cost so far, signs point to higher war bills yet to come as President Obama calls the strikes "open-ended," despite the fact that we simply cannot afford it.

Since invading Afghanistan in 2001, we are on track to spend a total of more than $1.5 trillion on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars before the end of fiscal year 2014 in September, including $817 billion for Iraq. Even before the current crisis, war spending was expected to keep going strong for the foreseeable future.

Never mind that troops left Iraq in 2011. Never mind plans to withdraw troops from Afghanistan over the coming year. President Obama’s requested war funds for fiscal year 2015 will not "decline precipitously” compared to previous years. Instead, the president is requesting $60 billion in war costs for fiscal year 2015. If that was the plan when we expected our involvement to be winding down, what will our costs be now that operations seem to be ramping back up? With every new step the U.S. takes into the Iraq conflict, war spending numbers will only rise.

Some lawmakers are calling on Congress to vote on U.S. involvement in Iraq citing worries that we will become involved in another long and expensive ground war. But, with election season upon us, a vote is politically risky and therefore unlikely, even though the American people have the right to weigh in on how we spend federal dollars.

Washington, DC – Yesterday, Congressman Walter Jones, Congresswoman Barbara Lee and Congressman Jim McGovern sent a letter to Speaker Boehner calling for debate and vote on an authorization for the use of military force in Iraq when the House returns on September 8th.

“It is imperative that Congress uphold its constitutional duty to authorize the use of our military. My colleagues and I urge Speaker Boehner to call a debate and a vote on an authorization to expand military force in Iraq so Congress can meet its constitutional responsibility. The situation in Iraq is a grave one and before sending our uniformed men and women into danger we owe it to them and the people we represent to fully debate the matter and have a vote,” said Congressman Jones.

“It is clear that the current mission in Iraq has extended beyond the limited, specific and targeted scope of preventing genocide and ensuring the security of U.S. personnel. The President must seek Congressional authorization before the situation escalates further,” said Congresswoman Lee. “Congress must have the opportunity to debate all options and consequences, including military, economic and diplomatic ones, to prevent the Islamic State (IS) from further destabilizing the region. If an authorization is necessary, it must be limited and specific to prevent passing of another blank check for endless war.”

“I know for some this would be an uncomfortable vote before an election -- but American forces are clearly engaged in military operations and being put in harm’s way,” Congressman McGovern said. “For their sake we owe them a thoughtful and deliberative process and an up-or-down vote. It’s clear that the U.S. mission has gone well beyond simply humanitarian assistance, beyond protecting U.S. personnel, and beyond just Iraq. If the overwhelming, bipartisan vote we took in July means anything, the Speaker should bring an authorization to the floor for a debate and a vote.”

Congressmen McGovern and Jones and Congresswoman Lee were the principle cosponsors of the bipartisan H. Con. Res. 105, which overwhelmingly passed the House before recess with 370 votes. The resolution stated: “The President shall not deploy or maintain United States Armed Forces in a sustained combat role in Iraq without specific statutory authorization for such use enacted after the date of the adoption of this concurrent resolution.”

The letter specifically calls on the House Foreign Affairs Committee to draft the authorization in order to provide a more nuanced approach that will include diplomatic and economic dimensions.

With respect to the growing conflict with the insurgent Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), my message to the White House and to Speaker Boehner is clear. Further U.S. military escalation must not happen without the expressed approval of Congress. the Constitution is crystal clear: Only Congress shall have the power to declare war.

The American people will no longer accept or support unilateral decisions by any President - Democrat or Republican - to take our nation to war after consulting with only a few Congressional leaders behind closed doors. The entire Congress, all 535 of the people's elected representatives, must have a say in the outcome.

Make no mistake. Any such ill-conceived escalation would prove to be a tragic and unnecessary waste of blood and treasure for the United States. Why?

1. We have no friends in this thousand-year old sectarian battle. Because we have no friends, America stands to become a target of every single one of the warring factions. And the weapons they use against us will be the very same weapons we have provided for them.

2. Once we become re-involved militarily in the region, finding a solution becomes OUR problem, and failure would only breed more hostility toward the United States. However, by not becoming involved, finding a solution becomes THEIR problem - a situation only they can ultimately resolve.

3. Victory against the ISIS forces would require U.S. 'boots on the ground.' While there is no doubt our military could indeed enter the conflict and achieve a victory, virtually every military expert who has weighed in agrees that airstrikes alone cannot assure the defeat of the ISIS forces. Retired Major General Lynn Hartsell, who served in Iraq in both Operations Desert Storm and Desert Shield and knows the region well, calls U.S. airstrikes against ISIS 'pinpricks" that will not deal a decisive blow. Senator John McCain is even more blunt. "You can't contain ISIS", he says. "You have to defeat it."

4. We face a long and exceedingly difficult challenge if we choose to expand our role. The President himself has been candid about that. He terms the new series of airstrikes in Iraq "open ended." And just last week, he told the American Legion that the battle against ISIS "will not be easy, and it won't be quick."

5. We can't afford it. As we continue to emerge from the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, another extended war in the Middle East will cost trillions of dollars we need to rebuild America and create good paying middle class jobs right here at home.

6. We have already given them a chance - 10 years, thousands of precious American lives, and a trillion dollars poured into the all but failed nation of Iraq alone. We gave them a chance, yet we had barely left when the region began descending back into chaos. Now the solution - if there is a solution - is up to them.

I will remain in regular consultation with the White House and with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle as this situation continues to unfold.

Meanwhile, I want to hear your thoughts. Feel free to contact any of our offices listed below, or visit my website, www.nolan.house.gov. Have a good week.

]]>End Wars and OccupationsThu, 04 Sep 2014 00:00:00 -0400The Speech on Diplomacy That Obama Should Have Given Last Nighthttp://www.pdamerica.org/component/k2/item/132-the-speech-on-diplomacy-that-obama-should-have-given-last-night
http://www.pdamerica.org/component/k2/item/132-the-speech-on-diplomacy-that-obama-should-have-given-last-night

Too often in the United States—most especially since 9/11—we equate “doing something” with “doing something military.” George W. Bush gave a traumatized, near-paralyzed US public two options: we either go to war, or we let ‘em get away with it. Faced with that choice, it was hardly surprising that 88 percent or so of people in this country chose war.

But the reality is that when there are no military solutions—which is most of the time, for those who care to notice, including on September 12, 2001—the alternative is not nothing, but active non-military engagement. Diplomacy becomes even more important. President Obama has said it over and over again: there is no US military solution in Iraq or Syria. He’s right. And yet military actions—in coalitions, with local partners, counter-terrorism but not counter-insurgency—were pretty much all we heard in his speech last night.

Obama’s four-part strategy to “degrade and destroy” ISIS (which he persists in calling ISIL, referencing the Levant, the old French colonial term for Greater Syria or al-Shams) tilts strongly towards the military. First, airstrikes, in Syria as well as Iraq. Second, military support to forces fighting ISIS on the ground, including support to the “moderate” Syrian opposition who challenge ISIS. Third, counter-terrorism strategies to “cut off its funding, improve our intelligence, strengthen our defenses, counter its warped ideology and stem the flow of foreign fighters.” And fourth, the only one not solely or primarily military, humanitarian assistance.

What’s missing is a real focus, a real explanation to people in this country and to people and governments in the Middle East and around the world, on just what a political solution to the ISIS crisis would really require and what kind of diplomacy will be needed to get there.

President Obama should have spent his fifteen minutes of prime time tonight talking about diplomacy. Instead of a four-part mostly military plan, he should have outlined four key diplomatic moves.

First, recognize what it will take to change the political dynamics of sectarianism in Iraq. The new prime minister talks a good line about creating a more inclusive government—but he has yet to choose new ministers to run the military and the intelligence/security agencies. And those are the very forces, for years controlled by sectarian Shia officials accountable to US-backed Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, responsible for most of the repression against Sunni Iraqis. That repression wasn’t small stuff, either. We’re talking widespread loss of jobs, attacks on communities, bombings, mass arrests, torture and extra-judicial killings against a huge swath of Sunni Iraqi society. Those are the people now backing ISIS, seeing it as the only force, however extreme and violent, capable and willing to challenge the sectarian government in Baghdad. And every time the United States drops another bomb, many in Iraq see it acting as the air force of the Kurds and the Shia against the Sunnis.

What’s needed is real pressure on the new government to reverse those years of anti-Sunni sectarianism. But at the moment, even though the United States pays much of the cost of the Iraqi government and is carrying out airstrikes for the government (and for the Kurds), Washington has less influence in Baghdad these days than Iran. So we need a new partnership—with the United States and Iran joining to push Iraq for a new, inclusive approach to governing. Even though Iran is itself predominantly Shia, Tehran is very worried about growing instability in their next-door neighbor resulting from the years of Shia sectarianism in Baghdad. The US-Iran nuclear talks are moving forward, and this should be the moment to broaden those talks to include discussion of a real “grand bargain” between the United States and Iran that includes all the regional crises.

Second, instead of a Coalition of the Killing, President Obama should have announced a new broad coalition with a political and diplomatic, not military, mandate. It should aim to use diplomatic power and financial pressures, not military strikes, to undermine ISIS power. Such a coalition would be far broader and far less fragile than a military alliance. All the regional governments have their own limitations on military action. Turkey knows that supporting, let alone joining, US-led airstrikes or other attacks on ISIS in Iraq or Syria could threaten the lives of its forty-nine diplomats and their families now held by ISIS. US ally Saudi Arabia will have to be pushed hard to stop arming and financing ISIS and other extremist fighters, but its dependence on US arms and military protection gives Washington plenty of leverage if it chose to use it. Turkey could be pushed to stop allowing ISIS and other fighters to cross into Syria from Turkish territory. US allies Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and others need to be pushed to stop financing and arming everyone and anyone in Syria who says they’re against Assad. (Those include the Al Qaeda franchise al-Nusra Front as well as the so-called “moderate” opposition fighters of the Free Syrian Army, who themselves beheaded six ISIS prisoners captured in August.)

Third, the Obama administration should, perhaps this month while Washington holds the presidency of the UN Security Council, push to restart serious international negotiations on ending the complex set of multi-faceted wars in Syria. Whether or not another UN envoy is appointed to replace Lakhdar Brahimi, who resigned in frustration months ago, negotiations must begin again. Everyone involved, on all sides, needs to be at the table: the Syrian regime; civil society inside Syria including nonviolent activists, women, young people and refugees; the various armed rebels; the Western-backed external opposition; and the regional and global players supporting all sides—the United States, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Turkey, Jordan and beyond. For the Obama administration, this could also provide a chance to partner with Russia on Syria policy, building on last summer’s successful joint effort to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons, and perhaps lessen tensions over Ukraine.

Finally, an arms embargo on all sides should be on the long-term agenda. This obviously isn’t something that will happen right away. But discussion about why it’s necessary could begin tomorrow. The United States has no leverage and no legitimacy in pressing Russia and Iran to end their support for the Assad regime in Damascus as long as Washington and its regional allies continue to arm and train the wide range of anti-Assad rebels. Qatar, Saudi Arabia and others, especially among the gulf states, have no reason to stop arming their various chosen factions as long as the United States ignores its own domestic requirements under the Leahy Law and the Arms Export Control Act to stop arms sales to known human rights violators in foreign militaries. A viable arms embargo will be on all sides or none. And once it’s on the agenda, it becomes a step towards another crucial goal, too often dismissed as impossible: a weapons of mass destruction–free Middle East, with no exceptions. Such a move would begin the process of inspecting and ultimately eliminating Israel’s powerful but unacknowledged nuclear arsenal, would confirm the non-military use of Iran’s nuclear power program and would end the propensity for WMD production in too many countries in the region. And it would be a fitting coda to a hard-fought and likely years-long diplomatic process.

Thirteen years ago, a draft dodger from Texas stood on a pile of rubble in New York City and promised, "The people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon." Of course, the people who flew the planes into the World Trade Center could not hear anybody, as their remains were buried in the rubble beneath Bush's feet.

And our government's extraordinary relationship with one of the world's last and most brutal absolute monarchies ensured that any accomplices still in the U.S. were quickly flown home to Saudi Arabia before the crime could be investigated. In 2003, Bush meekly complied with Al-Qaeda's most concrete demand, that he withdraw U.S. forces from military bases in Saudi Arabia.

A month after September 11, Donald Rumsfeld stood at a podium in front of a $2 billion B-2 bomber at Whiteman AFB in Missouri and addressed the aircrews of the 509th Bomber Wing, before they took off across the world to wreak misdirected vengeance on the people of Afghanistan. Rumsfeld told them, "We have two choices. Either we change the way we live, or we must change the way they live. We choose the latter. And you are the ones who will help achieve that goal."

Since then, the United States has launched more than 94,000 air strikes, mostly on Afghanistan and Iraq, but also on Libya, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. Rumsfeld's plan has undoubtedly achieved his goal of changing the way people live in those countries, killing a million of them and reducing tens of millions more to lives of disability, disfigurement, dislocation, grief and poverty.

A sophisticated propaganda campaign has politically justified 13 years of systematic U.S. war crimes, exploiting the only too human failing that George Orwell examined in his 1945 essay, " Notes on Nationalism." As Orwell wrote, "The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them." Orwell listed " torture, the use of hostages, forced labor, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians." The U.S. has committed all these atrocities in the past 13 years, and Americans have responded exactly as the "nationalists" Orwell described.

But some of the horrors of the U.S. invasions and occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan found their way into the conscience of millions of newly war-wise Americans, and President Obama was elected on a "peace" platform and awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. To the deep disappointment of his former supporters, Obama has overseen the largest military budget since WWII; an eight-fold increase in drone strikes; special forces operations in at least 134 countries, twice as many as under Bush; and a massive increase in the special forces night raids or "manhunts" originally launched by Rumsfeld in Iraq in 2003, which increased from 20 in Afghanistan in May 2009 to 1,000 per month by April 2011, killing the wrong people most of the time according to senior officers.

Like Eisenhower after Korea and other Presidents after Vietnam, Obama turned to methods of regime change and power projection that would avoid the political liabilities of sending young Americans to invade other countries. But the innovations of Obama's doctrine of covert and proxy war have only spread America's post-9/11 empire of chaos farther and wider, from Ukraine to Libya to the seas around China. Covert wars are no secret to their victims, and the consequences can be just as dire. The U.S. dropped more tonnage of bombs in its secret war on Cambodia than it dropped on Japan in WWII. As Cambodia imploded in an orgy of genocide, the CIA's director of operations explained that Khmer Rouge recruiting "has been most effective among refugees subjected to B-52 strikes."